In today's fast paced economy, many projects exist that require various goods or services, or goods and services to be provided by numerous organizations (hereafter, “sellers”) while also requiring relationships for providing and monitoring of either goods or services, or goods and services to be quickly and efficiently established. Examples of such projects include drilling for oil, commercial and/or residential construction, manufacturing complex objects (for example, aircraft and special use objects), and providing specialized services (for example, brokering excess power and bandwidth, and developing unique software products). When planning such projects, the person(s) responsible for the project (hereinafter, the “buyer”) is often faced with the daunting tasks of: (1) determining which goods or services, or goods and services are needed; (2) determining who provides such goods or services, or goods and services (i.e., who are the “sellers”); (3) establishing a dialogue with such sellers; (4) selecting at least one seller; (5) undertaking, starting and monitoring the project until completion or termination; (5) facilitating post-completion tasks (for example, paying sellers and other back-end processing); and (6) attempting to identify areas of improvement for future projects.
Commonly, when faced with such a challenge, many buyers rely upon antiquated systems and processes for accomplishing those tasks necessary to see a project through from start to post-completion. Such antiquated systems include utilizing business listings and other directories to identify sellers, negotiating agreements with the sellers via fax, telephone, and other non-real-time responsive systems, and making best guess judgments as to areas in which future improvements may be realized. As a result, many buyers relying upon such antiquated processes are often left behind in today's fast paced, Internet driven information economy. As such, a system is needed that allows buyers to be efficiently matched with sellers, and projects monitored and coordinated through all phases of the project.
For example, when constructing a building, a general contractor must decide which seller will provide excavation services, what type of materials to use, when the materials will be used, who will supply the materials, who will use the materials (i.e., who will actually construct the building) and other various factors. Currently, when constructing a building, the builder will often use a Rolodex® to determine which preferred sellers provide the desired goods or services, or goods and services. Upon identifying the sellers, the buyer may then engage in some dialogue with the seller about the project parameters, and may solicit proposals. Since each seller may identify a unique manner for accomplishing the specified task, the buyer is often left with trying to determine which seller is providing the best value, the best approach, the best timeliness, etc. Since such determinations can be quite time consuming, buyers generally do not have time to shop for other than a limited number of sellers for any given project. As such, new sellers on the market, and/or new techniques may often be overlooked.
Further compounding the problems faced by buyers in identifying and coordinating either goods or services, or goods and services from sellers is the fact that sellers often dictate which of the numerous currently available processes for processing either goods or services, or goods and services to use (e.g., auction, fixed price and quantity systems, and other systems well known in the art). For some of these processes, most of the essential terms of the agreement are dictated or controlled by the seller, with the buyer having little input over price, delivery terms, location, quantity, etc. (examples of such seller driven processes include retail, mail order, telephone, and some on-line sales systems). For example, a builder desiring to procure nails might be required by a retail sales process or an on-line sales process to purchase nails only in bundles of 200, for a set price. Since the buyer cannot modify the goods or services, or goods and services, or terms or conditions of the procurement process, the buyer's needs are often inadequately, untimely, and inefficiently fulfilled.
Additionally, recent automation of the aforementioned seller driven processes (for example, via the Internet) has not adequately addressed this problem. While the new automated processes generally enable a buyer to shop for either goods or services, or goods and services without having to travel to the seller's location or obtain a catalog, such processes are commonly characterized by sellers offering items of commerce under seller specified terms and conditions. Such processes do not allow a buyer to identify a project in terms of its specifications, and have the specifications translated into requests for goods or services, or goods and services that are then fulfilled in a timely and efficient manner by a seller providing the requested goods or services, or goods and services or suitable alternatives. Additionally, such processes often do not identify sellers of specialty of either goods or services, or goods and services and, therefore, are often inadequate for the provisioning of either goods or services, or goods and services that are not commonly mass marketed. In short, a more efficient process of matching buyers and sellers is needed.
Similarly, currently available buyer driven processes also do not facilitate the efficient matching of buyers and sellers. Examples of commonly available buyer driven processes include bidding processes and auctions. Regardless of the process (whether bid based or auction based), a buyer is generally first required to identify specific goods or services, or goods and services that are needed to complete a project. None of the processes allow a buyer to specify a project in terms of project details that are then automatically converted into requests for proposals, requests for specific goods, or other such proposals. Neither do any of the processes provide ready access to information to help a buyer, or seller, determine the appropriate details necessary to adequately specify a project or respond to such a request. As is appreciated by those skilled in the art, converting specifications for complex projects into specific requests for either goods or services, or goods and services is extremely time consuming, is often incomplete, and is extremely inefficient because the buyers often can not precisely identify and/or specify those goods or services, or goods and services and needed to fulfill a project. As such, today's buyer driven processes do not provide the degree of flexibility, specificity, and efficiency necessary for many buyers of either goods or services, or goods and services. Therefore, a process is needed that enables a buyer to procure those goods or services, or goods and services necessary to undertake and complete a project by providing a project's specifications to an automated process that facilitates the conversion of such specifications into requests for either goods or services, or goods and services and matches the buyer with sellers of such goods or services, or goods and services.
Additionally, once an agreement has been entered into to provide either goods or services, or goods and services needed to fulfill a project, systems are not available that enable both buyers and sellers to monitor the progress of the project, efficiently implement design changes, provide billing and other back-office functions, and determine areas for improvement by utilizing knowledge based systems. Thus, a process is needed that enables buyers/sellers to enter into agreements for projects and monitor such projects from initialization through post-completion/termination.
Similarly, once a job, or service has been performed, processes are not available that enable both buyers and sellers to efficiently compare and reconcile actual costs and technical specifications of the service with original proposals, purchase orders and invoices. Thus a process is needed to enable such reconciliation of proposal prices with actual costs before invoicing.
Further, with the advent of the Internet as another medium for the marketing of either goods or services, or goods and services, sellers have sought efficient and useful mechanisms for marketing their goods or services, or goods and services to buyers via web pages. In order to encourage buyers to visit the seller's web pages, at which their goods or services, or goods and services are often offered for sale or identified, sellers utilize various marketing mechanisms including: static marketing (where an advertisement is displayed as a static graphic or textual description on a portion of a buyer's computer screen); flash marketing (when an advertisement is flashed on the buyer's screen for a brief time period); banner marketing (wherein a “billboard” providing a hyper-link to the seller's web page is provided on a portion of a web page the buyer is currently viewing); and various other marketing mechanisms. In spite of these various and numerous methods of marketing via the Internet and other networks, such methods have been shown to be very inefficient in promoting either goods or services, or goods and services because such methods do not generally provide targeted marketing to buyers when they are most likely to consider acquiring a seller's goods or services, or goods and services, for example when they are undertaking a project in which the seller's goods or services, or goods and services may be utilized.
Therefore, a new method for providing marketing to buyers is needed. More specifically, a system and process is needed that combines the efficiencies and unique capabilities of the present invention, as explained further herein, to match buyers with sellers of either goods or services, or goods and services.